A key objective for financially constrained health systems, facing a growing and aging population with increasingly complex patients, is to obtain the best possible value from their budgets available.
Another concern of most health systems is to address health inequalities. Thus, health systems require incentivising policies that aim to deliver high-quality health care in the areas of highest need at the lowest feasible cost.
OHE conducts an extensive programme of research on health system policies, organisation and incentives. Our work aims to inform policy making globally in health care, social care and public health areas of greatest priority.
Examples of research topics that this theme addresses include:
- The intrinsic and extrinsic factors that incentivise agents in health systems, and how these yield certain behaviours and outcomes.
- The appropriate measures of productivity for health systems and the trade-offs between efficiency and effectiveness.
- The funding of health care and the roles of the public, private and charitable sectors.
- The measurement, prevention and reduction of health inequalities and discriminatory access to health and social care services.
Key objective for this research theme:
- To expand our understanding of the policies that aim to improve quality while safeguarding the long-term financial sustainability of health systems.
OHE’s policy positions:
- Health systems should appropriately incentivise the use of evidence-based, cost-effective interventions that support the development of healthier populations and achieve sustainability while being responsive to patients’ needs.
Our latest content on this theme

Reflections from the Region: Healthcare transformation in the Middle East
It’s not often that you witness a health system reinvent itself in real-time. And yet, this is precisely what is happening across the Middle East. Over…

Prevention pays off – so why aren’t we doing more of it?
We know that immunisation pays off: the wider societal benefits of childhood immunisation programmes in low and middle income countries outweigh their costs up to 51 times while…

Altering the Trajectory of HIV in Europe
Despite substantial medical advancements that have transformed HIV into a manageable chronic condition for individuals, the epidemic remains a pressing public health concern in Europe.

OHE submission to the UK Parliamentary Inquiry on an Ageing Society
OHE’s written submission to parliament focused on raising population health in older age and increasing access to fertility treatments as two possible avenues to address the challenges of demographic change.